'Errors' prevent prosecution of Lawrence friend

The best friend of Stephen Lawrence, the murdered black teenager, was cleared of charges of indecent assault yesterday after a judge ruled he would not have a fair trial following a "series of errors and misjudgements" by the prosecution.

The case against Duwayne Brooks, 23, collapsed at the Old Bailey after it was alleged that the "lay adviser" appointed to liaise between the alleged victim and police had acted improperly. Ironically, the use of lay mediators in racially sensitive cases was one of the recommendations made in the Macpherson Report into Stephen's death.

The collapse of the case came on the same day Scotland Yard made a renewed appeal for information about the unsolved Lawrence murder. Stephen's mother, Doreen Lawrence, and the officer in charge of the case, deputy assistant commissioner John Grieve, appeared on BBC1's Crimewatch UK programme last night to ask the public for help in catching the killers.

Mr Brooks, who was with Stephen when he was stabbed to death by a racist gang at a bus stop in Eltham, south-east London, in 1993, was alleged to have sexually abused an 18-year-old woman last September.

Judge David Stokes ruled that it would be unfair to proceed with the prosecution. Julia Krish, for the defence, had argued there had been an abuse of process because the lay mediator, Augusta Gibrill, had gone beyond her role and later refused to sign a statement.

The court was told that Ms Gibrill was appointed after consultation with the Greenwich Council for Race Equality.

The judge said: "Ms Gibrill was taken on with the best of motives but it had disastrous consequences."

The court was told that Ms Gibrill had rehearsed the evidence with the alleged victimand failed to make adequate notes of their conversation.

Later she made conflicting statements to the police about what the victim had told her. In one she claimed the teenager said that she had made up the allegation but was not going to admit this until she got to court so that both she and Mr Brooks would receive compensation.

Later Ms Gibrill changed her story, claiming that she had put this scenario to the complainant who had smiled and not said anything.

In the end Miss Gibrill refused to co-operate with the prosecution and declined to sign her statements. She was then abandoned as a witness.

The judge said: "The fact is that the prosecution has caused this situation by a series of errors and misjudgements."

He said he would have to stay proceedings, bearing in mind the "potential conflicts and inconsistencies" between Ms Gibrill and the complainant.

Mr Brooks, who last August issued writs for damages against 15 Scotland Yard officers involved in the Lawrence murder investigation, left court saying that the judge's decision was "a victory for justice".

"I have never done anything wrong. If we had gone to trial I would have stated that in my evidence," he said. "The judge agreed with defence counsel that the failings of the police and prosecution would not have allowed me to have a fair trial."

Meanwhile Mr Grieve, the head of the Metropolitan Police's racial and violent crimes task force, told television viewers there was still hope of prosecuting the gang of white youths who stabbed the A-level student to death.